Category: World Cup 2014

Team Melli draws the second practise match.

Team Melli played its second practice match in Johannesburg against Orlando Pirates of the South African Professional league on Wednesday. The match ended 3-3.

Unlike the first practice match , this one was played in a proper football pitch of Orlando pirates club. Team Melli scored through Khalatbary (9), Beigzadeh (52) and Nourozi (78)

The match was played in two 40 minutes period and was a part of the ongoing preparation for  the FIFA World Cup 2014.

Team Melli starting line up was : Ahmadi ; Montazeri , Hosseini , Sadeghi , Beigzadeh , Heidary , Teymourian , Haddadifar, Rahmani , Khalatbary , Ansarifard.

In the second half , the young goalkeeper Biranvand was given his chance as he replaced Rahman Ahmadi in goal. ALl the players, except for Ando , Rahmani and Montazeri were rotated during the game.

Team Melli could not repeat the convincing victory of Tuesday , however , Queiroz has emphasized that results do not matter at this stage and in these practice matches. A good test for Team Melli will be on the 2nd of May when the full team will be playing an international friendly against Mozambique.

Team Melli training camp in South Africa has been cut short by 5 days.

 

 

 

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Iran’s Team Melli choices are as follows:

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Iran
افتخار پارس
HONOR OF PERSIA
 
يك جهان ، يك ملت ، يك تيم
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افتخار پارس
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Team Melli camp Johannesburg: update News.

Carlos Queiroz has deployed some interesting tactics for the first friendly match of Team Melli in South Africa.

In the match that was played in the base camp of team Melli in Johannesburg, and in a pitch which did not resemble a football pitch, Queiroz decided that the opponents coach would referee the match while his assistance including Majid Saleh will be assistant referees!

Furthermore , Queiroz decided to play with 10 men only from minute 80 of the match, presumably  to test how his players will perform under pressure of one players short.  The South African team failed to score against Team Melli in the last 10 minutes , however it is not clear if the Africans have fielded a full strength team for this practice match.

In a post match statement , Queiroz said that his objective from this training camp practice matches is to improve the physical conditioning of the players “The result of the matches do not bother me one bit. I am more concerned on the physical side of my players and how to improve it in this short time that is available to me. We need to be tough both physically and mentally, improve our running and endurance.”  said the Portuguese coach.

“I am determined to take the team to Brazil and perform to our best ability provided we have unequivocal and full support form everyone (…)”

Meanwhile , Esteghlal player who joined the camp late , have been given a stern physical training to bring them back in shape. Some of the players were running with performance measuring devices for recording their vital sign.

Team Melli real test of this camp will be on the 2nd of May when they face the full national team of Mozambique.

Beitashour,Haghighi R.,Hoisseini,Davari,Nekounam-Sadeghi AH,Mahini,Ghoochannejad, Dejagah, Jahanbakhsh,Shojaei

Iran Vs Mozambique match brought forward.

Apr 23, 2014

Iran and Mozambique friendly match will be held on May 2, five days sooner than scheduled.  

The friendly match was originally scheduled for May 7 in South Africa’s training camp but the match will be held on May 2 since the Iranian football team will have to return to the country five days earlier.  Iran has been drawn in Group F of the 2014 World Cup along with Argentina, Nigeria, and Bosnia and Herzegovina.

The training camp in Johannesburg marred by absence of half of the players due to their clubs engagements in the AFC Asian Champions league , is now back to normal after most of the players left behind , joined the camp.
Team Melli first practice match was against a club side , Moroka Swallows and ended 5-0 victory for Iran

 The Asian heavyweight will leave Iran on May 12 to hold a training camp in Austria.  Iran will play Belarus and Montenegro in the pre-tournament camp.

Carlos Queiroz’s men will face Trinidad and Tobago in its final preparation for the 2014 World Cup. The match will be held in Sao Paolo, Brazil on June 8.

 The World Cup will begin in Sao Paulo on June 12 and will end in Rio’s famous Maracana stadium on July 13.  Iran will play Nigeria in Curitiba on June 16 in its first group match.

News: Team Melli in South Africa

The current Team Melli camp has been joined by additional two previously unannounced coaches from Brazil. Mohammad Nabi , the manager of Team Melli said these two coaches are recruited form Corinthians club of Brazil and will be replacing the departed Tony Simoez who reigned his post a couple of months back. The two unnamed coaches are added to the coaching staff team compromising of the recently recruited Majid Saleh , Oceano , Aghajanian, and Gasper.

On the other hand , the mystery of the team that was supposed to be facing Team Melli in a friendly match was finally unveiled hours before the kickoff. South Africa’s Moroka Swallows club will be the first opponent of Team Melli on Tuesday morning.

Team Melli officials refused to name the opponent teams until the last moments preferring secrecy to keep Team Melli rivals in Group F of the FIFA World cup in suspense and reducing the possibility of them observing Team Melli in action (…)

Today’s match will be the first test of the conditioning of the Iranian players. Much of the work carried out in South Africa was focused on the physical side to prepare Team Melli against the teams with better physical conditions and endurance. Mohammad Nabi re-emphasized the previous statements by Queiroz that this camp was set up for the domestic league players of Team Melli addressing their shortcomings in running , physical aspects and building body strength. Players in European leagues, do not need such training according to Queiroz.

The names of the other two or possibly three opponents of Team Melli in friendly matches remains a mystery.

Other major development of the cam p came from Queiroz who has decided to cut short the camp duration by 5 days. Team Melli coach was not very pleased by the start where he had to travel to Johannesburg with only 11 players out of 28 he selected for the camp.

The reason for cutting short the camp duration was offered by Mohammad Nabi . He said” Iranian players are very emotional lot and the long time away from their families is disturbing them ! In order to take some deserved rest and be with their families, we have decided to cut short the camp by a few days”

Mohammad Nabi also emphasized that the players who did not join Team Melli on the flight to Johannesburg are mot to be blamed and held accountable for their absence. They were under instruction from their clubs and hence are not culpable. He stressed that there is a big difference between an act such as Hadi Aghili when he left the camp or Mojtaba Jabbari who decided he will retire, both unilateral and personal decisions and the players of Team Melli held back by their clubs.

Rahman Ahmadi on his way to South Africa.

Team Melli’s number one goalkeeper , Rahman Ahmadi is reported to be on his way to South Africa to join the Training Camp.

Ahmadi is the only Sepahan player to be released from his club duties although the Esfahani team has to play its final and crucial match this week against Al Hilal of Saudi Arabia which determines the team that qualifies for the next round of the AFC Champions League. Recently Ahmadi has lost his starting place to his rival in the team , Shehab Gordan. The other 5 Sepahan players named in the Team Melli list , will remain with their club, pending further developments.

The announcement that Rahman Ahmadi is joining the team is a good news for TEam Melli as the squad was missing an important player in the Sepahan goalkeeper. Despite his low counts of his international caps, being under-shadowed by Mehdi Rahmati, Ahmadi remains the most experienced and arguably the best choice for Team Melli against the other young and inexperienced candidates that Queiroz has picked for the team.

After the weekend match between Bayern Munich and Eintracht Braunschweig, were Davari let in two soft goals against the Bundesliga champions, one filtering between his legs, Queiroz was probably alarmed by lack of experience between the posts and despite his initial exclusion of all Sepahan players , he elected to recall the most vital of the 6 players.

3 goalkeepers in Hamed Lak , Alireza Biranvand and Sousha Makani are already included in the South Africa training camp while Davari and the rest of the European based players are not invited due to club commitments and ongoing league competitions.

Queiroz excludes Sepahan players from Team Melli !

Sepahan players Out !

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[column size=”1/2″] In an exclusive news carried by ISNA , Carlos Queiroz has decided to exclude all of the 6 Sepahan players from Team Melli camp in South Africa. It is not clear if the 6 players will be recalled for the next training camp in Austria, but if Queiroz stands by his decision and does not recall the players again for the World Cup , it will be crises in the making especially in the goalkeeping department where Rahman Ahmadi (34 years)  is currently the most experienced of the goal keepers in Iran by far and arguably the best.

Joining the squad will be two goalkeepers, Alireza Biranvand , the  22 years old Naft Tehran keeper who represented Team Melli at youth level but never at senior level and Hamed Lak  , 24 years old of Tractorsazi keeper who has just 1 cap against Yemen in WAFF tournament two years ago.

Rahman AHMADI , Omid EBRAHIMI, Ehsan HAJSAFY, Yaghoub KARIMI, and Shojaa KHALILZADEH are the 6 players who were named in the original Team Melli squad. These players were retained by their club because of  Sepahan’s commitment in the AFC Champions League. Esteghlal also held their 4 players from joining Team Melli squad , based on the same justification as Sepahan but Queiroz has spared theses players from his wrath and gave them a few days of rest before calling them to join the rest of the squad in Johannesburg.

Tractorsazi and Foolad Khuzestan positively responded to TEam Melli plans and sent their players to the airport but Queiroz asked them to return back to their clubs to play in the AFC Champions league matchday 5!

[/column]
[column size=”1/2″] It is believed that Queiroz had a meeting with his staff and came up with this decision. Sepahan has still to play one more match next week which is a decider. A win is crucial for them to qualify for the next round of the AFC Champions League while any other result will spell the end of their participation in this competition. Sepahan has not qualified for the next season edition of the AFC Champions league due to their failure to grab one of the 4 possible places for Iran.

In the absence of any official sources regarding this decision , it is very much hoped that Queiroz decision is temporary and sanity will prevail when the dust settles down. The dispute between Queiroz and the club coaches has been brewing for month because of the ill timing of Team Melli training camp arranged while 4 clubs are still involved with AFC Champions League. The clubs all insisted that they will stick to FIFA regulation and will not play in the Champions League without their best players.   This decision did not please Queiroz nor some FFIRI administrators who have threatened all sort of punishments for the clubs, without referring to the rules and regulations governing such players releases.

The most vocal opponent of Queiroz plans was none other than Zlatco Kranjcar, Sepahan’s Croat coach ,  who accused Queiroz shortsightedness in arranging his schedule. Kranjcar has repeatedly said from the onset of this issue arising that there is no way that he will release his players for Team Melli while the club is involved in an official competition and Sepahan will strictly apply FIFA rulings.. [/column]
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KArim Ansarifard

Ansarifard & Lak join Team Melli squad in South Africa

Karim Ansarifard and Hamed Lak , the two Tractorsazi players have flown directly to Johannesburg to join their teammates at the South Africa training camp.

Their departure was initiated right after Tractorsazi were eliminated from the AFC Champions league after the defeat against Al Ittihad. This is good news for Team Melli especially since the squad departed with only 11 outfield players without a goal keeper. It is expected that Esteghlal players , who were also eliminated from the same competition , will also join the squad in South Africa. Karim Ansarifard has recently won the top goal scorer award in the league.

The fate of the remaining two teams players , Foolad Khuzestan & Sepahan , is still unclear in regard to joining the camp. Foolad has already qualified for the Knock Out stages of the AFC Champions League , while Sepahan  are still alive and stand a good chance of qualifying with one last match remaining.  Foolad Khuzestan has 3 players in the squad while Sepahan has 6.

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